Mr. Alan Williamsasked the Minister of Health (1) what qualifications are required for admission to courses for the training of technicians for a cervical cancer test service;
(2) how many technicians are now needed to establish a national cervical cancer test service; and how many applications he has received for training for this service;
(3) what measures have been taken to publicise the availability of training courses for technicians to be employed in the detection of cervical cancer.
§ Mr. K. RobinsonThose nominated to attend the courses at the special centres, who will play their part in training others on return to their regions, are normally state registered medical laboratory technicians. Local training courses organised by Boards may also be attended by hospital laboratory staff in training for registration. On the latest calculations the equivalent of some 350 whole-time technicians would be required to screen all women aged 35 and over. 130 technicians have been trained or are currently attending courses at the special centres and a further 60 are already booked for courses this year. In addition nearly 200 have attended or are at present attending local training courses. Since cytology is a part of hospital pathology, many of the trained staff necessarily work part-time286W on other duties: the training programme will therefore be continued vigorously. The establishment of the special training centres was publicised in a departmental memorandum last September and since then by Hospital Boards and Management Committees in filling their places at the special centres and on locally organised courses.